


Who will stand by that streetlight

by guineapiggie



Series: All This (and Heaven Too) [3]
Category: The Hour (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-29
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2021-01-08 06:43:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21231491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/guineapiggie/pseuds/guineapiggie
Summary: Hector looked back, trying to appraise if Freddie would make it to the car on his own – he didn’t look stable, muscles already shaking with exertion halfway down the front steps. But there was that same look of steely determination on his face that had got him into this mess in the first place, and Hector knew better than to argue.Freddie scoffed. “Are you really going to keep pretending Bel didn’t put you up to this?”“Are you really not going to thank me for picking you up?”





	Who will stand by that streetlight

“I could’ve called a cab,” he said, trying to struggle down the stairs with a sliver of dignity intact.

Hector rolled his eyes and snatched the satchel from his bony shoulder before it could slip off. “I’m happy to do it,” he muttered, trying to appraise if Freddie would make it to the car on his own – he didn’t look stable even without the added weight, muscles already shaking with exertion halfway down the front steps. But there was that same look of steely determination on his face that had got him into this mess in the first place, and Hector knew better than to argue.

Freddie scoffed. “Are you really going to keep pretending Bel didn’t put you up to this?”

“Are _you_ really not going to thank me for picking you up?”

Freddie reached the bottom step, leaning on the handrail with his full weight and his face even paler than usual, and somehow managed to glower at him. “Yes, thank you ever so much for treating me like a charity case.”

Hector sighed and tugged Freddie’s right arm around his shoulder, ignoring his young colleague’s protests and trying to swat down the dark thoughts tugging at the corners of his mind.

(_It’s my fault, _he heard Bel whisper in the cold light of the hospital corridor, cigarette quivering in her hand. _I said I wanted him to feel consequences_. _I _said _that, to his face, Hector._  
_God, Bel, we all did, _he heard himself answer, and the cigarette smoke still stung in his eyes.)

And _damn, _the man could be irritating – was doing his best to get on his nerves in this very moment – but it wasn’t supposed to be like this. He wasn’t supposed to be half-carrying, half-dragging brothers in arms home anymore, it was supposed to be _over, _he had put that behind him. And yet here they were, the brilliant, reckless, shattered boy leaning on him barely thirty, and putting up an unconvincing show of bravado. Bel’s voice had been hoarse in the mornings for so long Hector barely picked up on it anymore, and Lix’s glass shook in her hand when she thought nobody was looking. Randall’s pace slowed near Freddie’s desk, without fail, and Sissy excused herself to the bathroom whenever his name was mentioned and Isaac was pale and jumpy around loud noises.

Things weren’t supposed to be like this anymore. Never again, but here they all were.

“Come on, Freddie,” he muttered, his voice gentler than he’d meant for it to be. “Save the pride for later.”

“_Condescending,_” Freddie gave back through gritted teeth, but obediently limped alongside him across the pavement.

Hector made the mistake of glancing sideways, and caught sight of genuine pain on the younger man’s pale face. Sweat was forming on his forehead.

They’d hardly moved five-hundred yards.

He swallowed. _No sympathy_, _Captain. Same old song and dance_. He slowed his steps. “Yes. Sorry.”

“God, now you’re apologising.”

Hector bit down an irritable reply and steered them towards the car. “Just get in.”

Freddie all but collapsed against the car and Hector made a show of putting the satchel in the trunk and acting like he didn’t see his colleague struggling with something as basic as opening the door of a car.

It wasn’t right. Freddie had survived the Blitz unscathed, nibbling at fancy pasties and scones at the Elms’s and probably either shocking or charming everyone with his scrappy, working-class ways… he’d come out of the war without a scratch, and wasn’t that supposed to be it? Wasn’t that supposed to have been the whole _point_? Wasn’t that what he’d gunned down all those men to accomplish?

Now for his twenty-ninth, they could get Freddie a nice cane.

Hector scoffed and slammed the trunk shut. Sometimes he surprised himself with how bitter he could be.

“Nice car,” Freddie muttered, still out of breath. “What’d you do to deserve a bonus?”

Hector attempted a grin that didn’t feel very convincing. “Doing your job on top of mine, for starters,” he gave back, and it was supposed to be a joke, but it had too much truth to it. He hadn’t been the only one who had to compensate for a missing reporter, of course, but that was part of the horror of it: the war veterans had stepped in, all three of them with the same look of blank determination, and had picked up the pieces. Some days, most days, Bel threw herself headfirst into impossible amounts of work, never stopping for food or rest, only cigarettes; but then she’d suddenly put everything down and be absent, restless, unfocused, fraying at the seams. Meanwhile, Randall and Lix had straightened their backs, rolled up their sleeves and got on with it, knowing to keep in motion because the shock only got to you when you stopped, and Hector had found himself falling in line.

It was all terrifyingly familiar.

Freddie’s eyes had drifted shut, and rationally, Hector knew he ought to let him rest, but the sight unnerved him.

“I don’t know what Marnie’s going to do with her time now,” he joked lamely, squinting into the setting sun as they rounded a corner. “Without having to bake you those impossible treats. By the way, sorry for the onslaught.”

Freddie scoffed. “You don’t even begin to deserve her, Hector,” he muttered, eyes still closed.

“I know.” He took the easy way out, and turned up the radio. Traffic was a nightmare, and he shouldn’t be surprised – it was what, five-thirty? Supposedly, most people went home at this time. Not that either of them would know.

“They show you the letters we got?”

“Isaac brought a selection,” Freddie replied, blinking his eyes open with an annoyed look on his face. “Cut the small talk.”

“Damn it, Freddie, I’m trying to –“ He caught himself. To what? Help? Be _nice_?

“To what?” Freddie asked, predictably, cutting straight to where he'd tried not to go. Same old Freddie.

Hector felt a surge of aimless, helpless anger, and didn’t bite it back fast enough this time. “What do you want?” he snapped, eyes fixed on the cars ahead. “Do you want me to tell you how _stupid _it was? How much you gambled? How much _pain _you’ve caused the people I care about? Because I’d be happy to.”

He expected some witty, snappy reply, hoped for it, despite himself. But instead of the verbal slap that he probably deserved, there was a strange little pause, cynically scored by a stupid jingle for breakfast cereal, and then –

“I’m sorry.”

“What?” Hector said, blankly, glancing over to see Freddie fixing the taillights ahead.

“You’re right. I’m sorry.”

He blinked, then shook his head. “Don’t,” he said, and it sounded pleading. “Don’t apologise. It disturbs me.”

Freddie scoffed, but instead of repartee continued to stare out of the window in uncharacteristic stillness. A few turns later, a frown appeared on his face along with the familiar spark in his eyes. “I don’t live here. Where are you driving me?”

Hector allowed himself a wry smile. “Come on, Freddie. Let’s not.”

“Was neither of you going to ask me if I –“

“Your flat is not safe, Pike knows about it,” he said patiently. “And it’s not a wild assumption that you’d prefer her place to my couch.”

“The key term being _assumption._”

Hector sighed. “I’m just the driver. Still, I didn’t expect you… I figured you’d be happy to see her.”

Freddie’s eyes returned to the window, a bitter twitch playing around his mouth. “I would. But…” He paused, worrying at his lower lip, the streetlight ghosting over his pale face. “You’re different, all of you. How you look at me. And she… God, she hated coming to see me. She –“

“It gets better,” Hector said flatly. “It did for me, after the war. People get used to change. It just takes time.”

Freddie scoffed. “You didn’t come back a bloody _cripple. _I suppose that helped.”

He felt his jaw set. “I would have traded you for that limp.”

Freddie grimaces. “Right. I’m –” He shook his head in frustration and fiddled with the radio dial, then switched it off. “So she did tell you to pick me up.”

“What?”

“Bel. I asked.”

“Right. Like you didn’t know.” Hector sighed. “We are at her beck and call.”

Freddie smiled faintly. “Of course we are.”

The car pulled into her street, and Hector tapped his fingers against the steering wheel, scanning the street for a parking space.

“I… I don’t pretend to know what it’s like for you,” he said slowly, without looking at his colleague. “But cut her some slack. Don’t… push her away. We’ve all watched the two of you make each other miserable for long enough.”

Freddie threw him a look, but didn’t reply, and pointed towards an empty space. “There.”

“Bit far from the door.”

“I’ll manage. Stop fussing.”

Hector caught sight of the determination on his face, sighed, and parked the car. “Fine. If you fall flat on your face –“

“I promise I won’t blame you,” Freddie replied, lacking the usual bite.

**Author's Note:**

> owing to the war theme, i guess (and also my long and fruitless search for a better title), title from "Lili Marleen", a popular song with soldiers on both sides during WWII:
>
>> Und sollte mir ein Leids geschehen  
Wer wird bei der Laterne stehen  
Mit dir, Lili Marleen?
>> 
>> **\- Lili Marleen (1938)**  

> 
> (and if ill should befall me/ who will stand by that streetlight/with you, Lili Marleen?)


End file.
